Treatment of Asylum seekers – government learns nothing
JVL Introduction
Care4Calais has shared this letter by David Neal, the Independent Inspector for Borders and Immigration. His letter to the government in relation to the Detention Centre at Wethersfield raises serious concerns that would be seriously worsened if the proposed increase in the number of people there (from 550 to 800) was implemented. They are also raising money for a legal challenge to the use of this Centre and you can donate through the link to the original posting.
Refugee Charities and campaign organisations are extremely worried about the treatment of refugees, the potential passing of the Rwanda Bill – at the same time as the government has granted asylum to a small number of Rwandan people. We have published before about the Bibby Stockholm barge housing asylum seekers, another detention centre where a detainee has killed themselves. Previous investigations, eg last Autumn’s into Brook House, which found asylum seekers were degraded there raised similar concerns and yet the lack of humane provision for people already traumatised shockingly continues.
The need for compassion and a humanitarian approach to asylum seekers is clear, instead they continue to be too often vilified and even investigated by government for converting to Christianity and seen mainly as “a problem” rather than people who need support and safety so that they can also contribute.
LL
This article was originally published by Care4Calais on Mon 12 Feb 2024. Read the original here.
Government Inspector’s damning report on Wethersfield
Below is the highly critical letter sent to Tom Pursglove, Minister for Legal Migration and the Border, from the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration, about conditions at Wethersfield Barracks.
The letter confirms the risks to residents health that Care4Calais has warned about since the opening of this prison-like camp to house people seeking asylum: the inspector specifically refers to “the risks resulting from the tensions that will inevitably arise when a sizeable population of men is being accommodated in a remote location, with very limited information on what the future might hold for them and with very little to do.”
That such a letter should have to be sent in the first place is a disgrace, and a damning comment on the inhumane conditions at the camp.
Unlike Care4Calais, I think our government really does not care about the inhumane conditions of Wethersfield, the ‘overwhelming feeling of hopelessness’. More and more it seems ‘humane’ treatment is conditional on what people represent to those in power. For the Tories, the profound boredom and frustration delivered by Wethersfield serves usefully as a punishing deterrence to those seeking asylum in the UK. To be ‘accommodated’ there must feel like psychological warfare. With the added fact that any outbreak of consequent violence will only stoke the far-right’s dehumanizing, demonizing anti-immigrant narrative….
So I beg to differ a little from JVL. This government, and I fear the next, is learning lessons – from the far-right.
Last week I learnt from a charity supporting asylum seeking women with babies and/or who are pregnant, that these women are denied the usual provision of vitamins given to the general population. These are women who are often coping with living with their families in one room in a hotel where access to cooking facilities are frequently absent. Barbaric!
I joined UK against Racism a while ago and I’m shocked at the number of people that are repeating the Lies and Propaganda you see in the Mail, the Sun and hear from the Government, you can hear the venom in their statements.
This is what makes it easy for the Government to be Racist in its actions. I don’t believe anything will be any better if the LP wins the next GE.
Instead of tackling the causes of why people flee their homeland, nothing will change.